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ARS Home » Pacific West Area » Hilo, Hawaii » Daniel K. Inouye U.S. Pacific Basin Agricultural Research Center » Tropical Plant Genetic Resources and Disease Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #232915
Title: Determining sex and screening for the adventitious presence of transgenic material in Carica papaya L. seed germplasm

Author
item Matsumoto Brower, Tracie
item Zee, Francis
item Suzuki, Jon
item TRIPATHI, SAVARNI - UNIVERSITY OF HAWAII
item Carr, James
item Mackey, Bruce

Submitted to: HortScience
Publication Type: Peer Reviewed Journal
Publication Acceptance Date: 11/7/2009
Publication Date: 1/1/2010
Citation: Matsumoto Brower, T.K., Zee, F.T., Suzuki, J.Y., Tripathi, S., Carr, J.B., Mackey, B.E. 2010. Determining sex and screening for the adventitious presence of transgenic material in Carica papaya L. seed germplasm. HortScience. 45:161-164.

Interpretive Summary: Papaya Ringspot Virus (PRSV) is a devastating disease that has a detrimental impact on both commercial papaya production and Caricaceae germplasm conservation. Similar to human vaccinations, placing a non-functional copy of part of the virus into the papaya plant results in resistance to that disease. There is public concern over the technique used to create this virus resistance papaya. Since we are a papaya "seed bank" whose mission is to preserve and characterize all related papaya species, we have used DNA based technology to ensure that the introduced genes do not contaminate other papaya collections.

Technical Abstract: Papaya Ringspot Virus (PRSV) is a devastating disease that has a detrimental impact on both commercial papaya production and Caricaceae germplasm conservation. The PRSV coat protein transgenic line 55-1 and derived progeny are resistant to PRSV and have saved the papaya industry in Hawaii. However, similar to transgenic crops throughout the world there is public concern on cross contamination of non-transgenic lines. As the designated germplasm repository for Caricaceae we are responsible for maintaining the genetic integrity of each accession. Therefore, we have developed a protocol utilizing polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for the detection of adventitious presence of transgenic material in both the parental plants and the resulting seed population by testing each for the 55-1 transformation event to assure a 99.9% chance of obtaining greater than 99.5% transgene free seeds. The protocol developed in this study is not typical for most seed validation techniques since this there is a higher than normal producer risk in testing however, we believe this is necessary to ensure the genetic integrity of seeds stored in the repository.